Borders goes bankrupt in the U.S.

Borders, the second largest chain bookstore in the U.S. has gone bankrupt! 2011 is not shaping up to be a good year for brick & mortar book sellers.

Read details here.

It isn't really a surprise. Borders has been in trouble for a while, and were slow to embrace online sales. In fact, Borders used Amazon for online sales until 2008, and they have contracted Kobo as their eBook channel.

Borders (and other large chains) were responsible for the loss of countless independent bookstores, so this may be good news to small, struggling bookstores in markets where Borders will be closing mega-stores. So it isn't ALL bad news.

List of alternatives to closing Borders stores.

Like the H.B. Fenn bankruptcy, this means a lot of publishing houses are owed a lot of money that they may never see. A wave of bankruptcies or companies scaling back publishing plans is more and more possible. Physical books are hardly doomed... but eBooks are going to continue to look better and better as long as the bad news for physical books continues.

Yesterday...

So, I started writing my mémoire, in a pretty rough draft format, and it brought back a lot more memories than I expected. It turns out that when you start to really concentrate on your past, you can pull out all kinds of interesting memories that otherwise would languish in obscurity. I spent almost two hours writing "stream of consciousness" memories without editing or spell checking. I suppose I might go back and edit the results into a second and/or third draft at some point, but who knows... my intention was not to eventually publish an autobiography or something.

No, my plans were to confront my demons, dredge up painful truths, and face my regrets. And, like anyone, I have a lot of all three. As I wrote yesterday, I felt a terrible sense of loss. Loss of innocence? Not sure. Loss of loved ones? Definitely. All of my grandparents and great uncles and aunts have passed on, and it is surprisingly painful to write about them even now.

I have only made it to the age of seven so far, but I have a whole year to write my mémoires to the age of fourty or so. I might go further, but my life is a moving target and I do want to finish this thing at some point.

The next entry will cover the move to the house on MacLellan St, meeting new friends, starting at a new school, and maybe end with my second sister's birth.

Biography or memoire?

I've been reading Is Life Like This, by John Dufresne, and one of his biggest suggestions (at least early in the book) seems to be to write an autobiographical history. Not necessarily for other to read, perhaps just as a source of ideas for stories. But it got me thinking, perhaps that would be a good idea for me.

My personal memoire

Reasons:

• Writing is good practice for writing, and remembering the past is exactly the same as remembering (imagining, if you will) the future.
• Writing about painful memories might help me to exercise some personal demons.
• Writing honestly is hard, writing honestly about myself might be impossible... but it is a worthy goal.
• Writing about my past might help me to conjure up some good memories that I haven't thought about in years.
• Maybe, just maybe, it will be of interest to others.

So, over the next year, I am going to try to cover my life story. Not always in detail, and I will try to remember to leave other people's names out, but I'll write what I remember as honestly and fully as I can.

Web Sites and Writing

I spent the morning setting up several more book pages on my wordpress blog. Having a separate section/blog for each book is great for several reasons:

1. I will use each of these dedicated blogs to help me to stay focused... they are a public statement that I am working on each of those books.
   
2. I can use the blogs to post samples and ask for feedback.
3. I can use the blogs to help organize research and background for each book.
4. Finally, I can use the blogs for marketing purposes once the books are ready to be published.
   

So far, I have setup spots for the following novels:

A Forbidden Path
This is going to be a dark fantasy novel about a young man who, forced to abandon his heritage, takes an interest in forbidden magic. Might end up being high-fantasy or fantasy-horror by the time it is done, but the plan is dark fantasy.

Technology of the Soul
This is the story of a former priest who regains his faith just as the church and the human race have lost theirs. This book is science-fiction, and is set in the near future. This may end up as a trilogy, as the first story will only scratch the surface of what this future world really means.

The Darkness Encroaches
This horror novel is set in the future, after an apocalypse has destroyed civilization and humanity has carved a new life for itself out of the ruins.

Largest Canadian-owned book distributor goes bankrupt

H.B. Fenn, Canada's largest ditributor of books has gone bankrupt! Apparently it was well known that the company was in trouble, but the bankruptcy was something of a surprise.

You can read more details here.

H.B. Fenn doesn't just push books around, they own Key Porter Books. So far, Key Porter seems okay, but it seems probable that they will get sold off or picked apart.

What does this mean to Canadian authors? Probably not a lot, since who distributes books doesn't really mean much to the author, but it is a sad day for Canada none-the-less.

Half-Day

Today is a half day, and perhaps a chance to catch up on my writing challenge (2000 words behind already). I'm leaving work soon to drive my parents to Kingston, to see the plastic surgeon who worked on my father's eyes.

Driving will be a lot more pleasant today, since it is cold and clear. Yesterday we had the "storm of the century" blow through... and while it was not as bad as predicted, driving was treacherous and my parents are nervous passengers.

Snow Day?

I hope tomorrow is a snow day! It feels like I have only missed work because of weather maybe three or four times in as long as I can remember... perhaps twenty years. I'm too adventurous or the weather just isn't all that bad in eastern Ontario any more. Or both.

It seems like this storm has some potential, though, with news agencies reporting thousands of cancelled flights and one hundred million people potentially missing work. If that is true, perhaps there is some hope for me! ha ha

I was feeling a little under the weather today, so I missed my writing target for the day... in fact, I didn't write one word towards a novel. Going to have to make it up tomorrow if I want to average 1000 words a day in February.